A R T I C L E

ThePrintinghofBlake’hDanteEngravingh

RobertN.Ehhick

Blake/AnIlluhtratedQuarterly,Volume24,Ihhue3,Winter1990/1991,pp.

80-90

80 BLAKE/ANILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY Winter 1990/91

The Printings of Blake's Dante Engravings

By Robert N. Essick

As readers of the annual sales reports

in this journal may have noticed,

complete sets of Blake's engraved illus-

trations to Dante's Inferno have consis-

tently fetched over $30,000 at auctions

during the last few years. As a conse-

quence of this high value, dealers have

become increasingly interested in ways

of ascribing a particular set of the seven

plates to a specific press run since the

earliest impressions would command

the highest prices. In response to re-

quests for information on this matter,

as well as a desire to demonstrate how

economic imperatives influence the

study of printed images as much as

their making, I began to study various

sets of the Dante plates to correlate

their physical characteristics with the

known dates of printing. Since there

are records of only three print runs in

the nineteenth century, the problem

seemed easily solvable. But the situa-

tion is far more complicated than I had

anticipated, as the following report

will demonstrate.

The documentary record of print-

ings is less complete, and its inter-

pretation by scholars less accurate,

than one would wish. The first to offer

any information on the subject were

Bentley and Nurmi, who in their 1964

Blake Bibliography quote from per-

tinent documents in the Joan Linnell

Ivimy collection. Since John Linnell

had commissioned the Dante illustra-

tions from Blake in 1824, and since the

copperplates remained in the Linnell

family's possession until their sale to

Lessing J. Rosenwald in 1937, these

records have considerable authority.

In a "List of John Linnell Senior's Let-

ters and Papers," John Linnell, Jr.,

wrote that the Dante plates "have been

printed at two dates, after a few proofs

by Blake—Jlohnl. L[innell]scn. in 1

S[eries]—(at Bayswateii)] had India

proofs taken (all disposed of)[.l soon

after J. Ls death 0- L- jnr)—had 50

copies (india on drawing paper)

printed by Holdgate."1 This statement

provides crucial information: there

were only two printings, laid India

paper (or chine applique) was used

for both, and Holdgate Bros, printed

the second issue of 50 impressions

"soon" after Linnell's death in 1882.

We are not informed, however, about

the date, printer, and press run of the

first printing.2 Fortunately, other

records in the Ivimy collection fill in

these gaps. Two receipts from the plate

printers Dixon & Ross, No. 4 St. James's

Place, indicate that £2.15s. was paid by

Linnell on 26 September 1838 for "25

of each of 7 Plates Dante India," and a

further £1.10s. on 2 October 1838 for

"95 Imp", of 7 Pits. Dante India."3

These receipts make it clear that there

were actually two early press runs. That

they were paid for only a week apart,

and may have been performed even

closer in time, accounts for the younger

Linnell's reference to nineteenth-cen-

tury printings at only "two dates," a

habit continued by modern scholars

but one that I will abandon here. As for

the third printing, a draft of a letter

from John Linnell, Jr., to the London

book dealer Bernard Quaritch, dated 6

May 1892 states that the Dante "proofs"

(i.e., impressions from the 1838 print-

ings) had been "disposed o f and that

the family was "about to obtain a few

more copies of proofs—similar to the

former ones." Bentley and Nurmi

reasonably conclude that "the second

[i.e., third] commercial printing of the

Dante plates was therefore about

1892" (89).

The letter actually sent by the

younger John Linnell to Quaritch has

never been located, but in October

1989 Arthur Freeman discovered a let-

ter from another Linnell son, William,

in the archives of Bernard Quaritch,

Ltd. The references to both the Job and

Dante engravings make this previ-

ously unrecorded letter worth printing

in full:

May 18th. 92 The Avenue 76 Fulham Road

SW

Dear Mr Quaritch

I waited a few days before sending you the five sets of Job you ordered—thinking I might send the Dante same time—but my brother James whom I saw yesterday tells me that there is a hitch in getting the Dante printed because the man whom my father employed & whom we wish to do it now is ill, though he is expected soon to recover— I told my brother that I would undertake to get it done safely & as well by some others—but in the country they are I think too conservative & slow coach— however I will have my man bring up the 10 sets of Job either tomorrow or Friday— I was about writing fathers to bring me 5 sets tomorrow but if they cannot look out the 10 in time he will bring them up Friday. With regard to the printing of the Dante it occurs to me that perhaps you might know who is the best copperplate printer in Lon-don and if you know that he is also thoroughly trustworthy (supposing we left the plates in his hand for a time) I think we might save time. —of course I should give the printer precise instructions as to the style of printing, etc.

With regard to the Papers which you alluded to in a previous letter—have you any suggestions to make as to the par­ticular kind?

I rather think that Whatmans drawing paper is the nearest in quality and ap-pearance to the old prints. I mean India on Whatman. So at present I cannot say any definite time when the Dante will be ready— but I will endeavour to get on as fast as I can make my brother James move on—he being Co Trustee we must go together.

Yours dearly and very truly William Linnell

Winter 1990/91 BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY 81

Several details in this letter are sig-

nificant. Since the elder Linnell died in

1882, "writing father[']s" for more Job

impressions must refer to his home at

Redstone Wood, Redhill, Surrey, which

John Linnell, Jr., probably inherited as

the eldest son. Surprisingly, there is no

direct reference to John Jr. (born 1821),

for the letter is written as though Wil-

liam (born 1826) and James (born 1823)

had sole responsibility for the reprint-

ing of the Dante plates.4 William's re-

quest for advice on finding a printer for

the plates opens up the possibility that

Holdgate was chosen on Quaritch's

recommendation. In his draft letter of

6 May, John Jr. notes that the restrikes

should be "similar" to the 1838 impres-

sions. William's letter stresses this desire

to imitate the earlier printings and

alerts us to the possibility that impres-

sions on Whatman paper are from the

c. 1892 printing.

The 1838 receipts, quoted above, are

unambiguous as to the number of im-

pressions (25) taken from "each of 7

Plates" in the first printing; but the

record of the second printing, paid for

on 2 October, leaves the precise num-

ber in doubt. Did Dixon & Ross pull 95

impressions of each of the seven plates,

thereby producing 95 complete sets, or

a totalof 95, thereby yielding 13 Dante

sets plus four extra prints? The former

might seem the more likely, in spite of

the absence of the word "each," since

the first receipt records the number of

sets rather than the total number of

impressions. At least this would ap-

pear to be the reasoning behind Sir

Geoffrey Keynes's statement, in his re-

vised Blake Studies of 1971 and again

in the Blake Trust facsimile of the Dante

engravings (1978), that a total of 120

sets were printed in 1838 (i.e., the 25

paid for on 26 September plus 95 paid

2 October).5 This figure has been fre-

quently repeated by dealers and auction

houses and seems to have been widely

accepted as an indisputable fact. But

one detail in the 1838 receipts should

give us pause. If 25 sets cost £2.15s. on

26 September, why would 95 cost only

slightly more than half that amount six

days later?

Bentley provides answers to the

questions surrounding the 1838 press

runs in his Blake Books of 1977. He

prints therein the following transcrip-

tion made by Iain Bain from the day-

books (i.e., business records) of Dixon

& Ross:

Wednesday 26 September 1838 Mr Linnell 25 of each of 7 pits Dante Ind[ta]

87 1/2 Sh[a2its. of th[*dk. pl[a]$e] Coliombier] [i.e. 2 pulls per sheeA

25 [sheets] of India [7 pulls per sheeft Saturday Septr 29th 1838 Mr Linnell 95 Imp"5 of 7 pits Dante India

[i.e. 13 4/7sets] 47 Shts of Pit. Col. [2pulls per sheets 13 4/7 [sheets] of India [7'pulls per

sheet\6

This daybook apparendy records the

actual printing, as distinct from the bill-

ing dates, and thus the two press runs

occurred only three days apart. As

Bendey's bracketed interjections indi-

cate, these two printings yielded 38

sets (and four additional impressions),

not the proverbial 120. His accurate

figure is crucial in shaping expecta-

tions about extant suites of the engrav-

ings. If the larger number had been

produced, then we could expect that

most extant sets were printed in 1838

since only 50 were produced c. 1892.

But we now know that well over half

of the 88 documented nineteenth-cen-

tury impressions on laid India were

printed c. 1892. Given the additional

54 years in which the 1838 impressions

could have been destroyed or lost, we

can expect most extant suites to con-

sist of c. 1892 impressions.

Both 1838 press runs recorded in the

Dixon & Ross daybook used "Col[ora-

bier]" paper. This apparent reference

to the venerable French papermaker

was probably the basis for Keynes's

assertion that all 1838 impressions are

on "French Colombier paper."7 How-

ever, by the late eighteenth century,

"Colombier" was regularly used in ref-

erence to a sheet size, not a specific

manufacturer or country of origin.8

The Colombier produced by Whatman,

whose paper Blake used for many of 1. Dante engravings plate 6, "The Pit of Disease: The Falsifiers." Image 24.1 x 34 cm., plate-mark 27.7 x 35.6 cm. Pre-publication proof, probably printed by Blake. British Museum, Department of Prints and Drawings.

82 BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY Winter 1990/91

2. Dante engravings plate 3, "The Baffled Devils Fighting." India paper laid on wove, image 24.1 x 33.4 cm., plate-mark 27.9 x 35.6 cm. Formerly Essick collection.

his illuminated books and the Job en-

gravings, measures 34 1/2 x 23 1/2

inches (87.6 x 59.7 cm.).9 Further, the

Dixon & Ross daybooks show that the

firm acquired five quires of Colombier-

size paper in 1835 from S. Tipper &

Co., agents for Whatman.10 Thus, there

is no reason to assume that any 1838

impressions were printed on a paper

of French manufacture. A French paper

may have been used, but I have yet to

find a Dante set, or any record of a set,

definitely printed on such a paper.

Armed with the documentary record

surveyed above, we can now turn to

extant suites of the Dante engravings.

Our concern should focus on the quality

of the impressions, particularly as this

shows various amounts of wear in-

dicative of printing sequences, and the

paper on which they are printed. Hand-

written inscriptions and provenance

information can also supplement the

primary physical evidence.

We can begin by setting aside the

easily-identifiable impressions pulled

in this century. In 1953-55, Rosenwald

had sets printed on heavy, dead-white

wove paper with a surprisingly bold,

pebble-grain surface. The plates had

to be printed with considerable pres-

sure in order to smooth the paper suf-

ficiently to register fine lines. In a

complete suite of these restrikes in the

Huntington Library, San Marino, Cali-

fornia, each sheet measures 35.5 x 50.5

cm. and is inscribed in pencil, lower

right, "Impression taken from the cop-

per plate in my collection 1953-41.1

Lessing J Rosenwald 4/19/55." One

sheet shows a watermark ("MADE IN

ENGLAND [space of approx. 15 cm.]

LINEN FIBRE"); another bears a few

fragments of these letters. A set in the

National Gallery of Victoria, Melboume,

has the watermark on four sheets, plus

a countermark ("UNBLEACHED AR-

NOLD") on the remaining three, and

is inscribed on each plate, "Impression

taken from the plate in my collection

in 19551.1 Lessing J. Rosenwald

1/20/60."" I suspect, but cannot con-

firm, that all these restrikes bear some

version of the pencil inscription. The

dates following the signature appar-

ently record the time of inscription and

presentation, not printing. Keynes, Blake

Studies, notes that "twenty sets, with

three extra prints of the first plate"

(229) were produced in this reprinting.

He records the same number of sets,

without reference to the extra pulls of

plate 1, in Blake's Illustrations of Dante

(131). Todd, Blake's Dante Plates (see

note 13), states that Rosenwald wrote

him, "on August 22 [1968?], that to the

best of his recollection, 25 sets were

pulled in 1955" (4). Fortunately, the

differing statements about the date and

number printed do not hinder the recog-

nition of the c. 1954 impressions on the

basis of the pencil inscriptions and

paper. Some plates yielded fairly decent

impressions in this printing, but others

are weak and flat. Plate 3, "The Baffled

Devils Fighting," is little better than a

pale ghost in the Huntington set.12

Rosenwald commissioned a further

printing of 25 sets in 1968.13 These

were pulled by Harry Hoehn, who thor-

oughly cleaned the copperplates, on

Japanese "Kochi," a laid paper, with

The one set on "German copper-plate"

)par- (Todd 5). The Kochi paper (or "Koji,"

land the name of a papermaking district,

Blake not a specific manufacturer) is fairly

with thick but soft, with a much smoother

date" surface than the pebble-grain paper

iting. used c. 1954. In a letter dated 29 July

sets, 1968 to Ruthven Todd, Rosenwald

lis of stated that he inscribed each impres-

~>ante sion in pencil, "Printed by Harry Hoehn

(see 7/68 . . . Restrike from a plate in my

vrote collection . . . Lessing J. Rosenwald"

0 the (Todd 6). A 1968 suite on thick wove

were paper (apparently the "German cop-

, the per-plate") in the Rosenwald Collection,

1 and National Gallery of Art, Washington,

2cog- lacks the reference to Hoehn but is

nthe inscribed on each plate, lower right

and just beneath the image, "A restrike from

ecent the copperplate in my collection August

thers 1968U Lessing J Rosenwald" (see illus.

iffled 5). This set, with a sheet size approx-

lan a imately 36.5 x 45 cm., also bears a light 12 pencil inscription lower in the right

irther corner on all but plate 4, "printer's

Tiese proof 7/68," written by Ruth Fine, Cura-

thor- tor of the Rosenwald Collection. Accord-

s, on ing to Gott (see note 11), the 1968 set

with in the National Gallery of Victoria

Winter 1990/91 BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY 83

3. Detail of illus. 2.

bears Rosenwald's inscription plus a

separate pencil note: "21/25 [i.e., im-

pression 21 of a total of 25] Hoehn imp

[19168." Another such set, described as

printed on "Koji" paper, was offered at

Sotheby's New York on 22 June 1977,

lot 43A, but brought only $400. Other

1968 sets on Kochi paper are in the

National Gallery of Art, Washington

(sheets 38.1 x 45.7 cm.), the British

Museum, Department of Prints and

Drawings, the Tate Gallery, and the

collection of G. E. Bentley, Jr.

In his essays, Todd is forthrightly

critical of the c. 1954 impressions but

praises the 1968 restrikes. He states

that the latter are "more brilliant and

show far more detail than any" others

he had ever seen (6). Keynes is far

more restrained, pointing out that

"whether the result obtained [in 1968]

with rather heavy inking (on dead-

white Chinese [sic] paper) compares

favourably with the first printing . . . is

a matter of individual taste and judge-

ment" (Blake's Illustrations of Dante [3D-

As a comparison between the nineteenth-

century impressions of plate 3 (illus. 2

and 4) and a 1968 print (illus. 5) repro-

duced here will indicate, the heavy

inking was only partially successful in

bringing out the fine lines, such as

those defining the mountain ridges and

clouds top right, and had the unfor-

tunate consequence of obscuring the

distinctions between individual lines

in densely engraved areas on the fight-

ing devils and in the fiery lake lower

left. This latter effect violates the line-

arist aesthetic implicit in the engraving

style Blake deployed in his Dante plates.

In my view, the 1968 restrikes are

greatly inferior to all the nineteenth-

century impressions I have seen. But

no matter what one's opinions may be

about the two twentieth-century print-

ings, they offer no problems in iden-

tification.

The very earliest impressions of the

Dante plates can also be recognized

easily. In his memorandum quoted

earlier, John Linnell, Jr., mentions that

"a few proofs" were pulled "by Blake"

himself. In this context, the word

"proofs" might mean nothing more

than "impressions," but at least some

of them represent states earlier than

those found in the 1838 and all sub-

sequent printings. The identification

of these earliest extant Dante prints

rests simply on their states. I describe

below the few proof-state impressions

I have been able to locate.

Pi. 1, "The Circle ofthe Lustful: Francesca da Rimini (The Whirlwind of Lovers')." Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton, New Jersey. Lacking many lines of shading and radiance, the dry point inscription in reverse letters lower right ("The Whirlwind of Lovers from Dantes Inferno Canto V"), the hands ofthe couple in the sphere upper right, and the inverted head between the whirlwind and the waves just left of the peninsula on which Dante lies. The heads of the two figures in the top left corner are re-cut in slightly different positions in the published state. Darkly but crudely inked. Reproduced Keynes, Blake's Illustrations of Dante. Laurence Binyon, The Engraved Designs of William Blake (London: Ernest Benn, 1926), lists an even earlier state in which the "forms of the lovers are hardly more than outlines" and "there is a white patch in the river-bank under Virgil's fig-ure" (76). This was probably one of the unstated number of "proofs in early states" Binyon notes as then belonging "to Mrs. Sydney Morse" (76), but I have not been able to locate an impression of it. The other Morse proofs were probably those for pis. 2, 6-7 (described below), accessioned 13 July 1929 by the British Museum.14 There were no Dante plates in the auction of the Sydney Morse collection, Christie's, 26 July 1929.

PI. 2, "Ciampolo the Barrator Tormented by the Devils." British Museum, Depart-ment of Prints and Drawings, accession no. 1929.7.13.273. Some of the spiky wings around the devils on the right lack hatch-ing strokes. A little more hatching appears on the upper thigh ofthe front-most seated figure on the right. This work appears to have been burnished away in the publish-ed state to create a highlight.

Pi. 4, "The Six-Footed Serpent Attacking Agnolo Brunelleschi." Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, bequeathed by T. H. Riches in 1935 and accessioned 1950. Printed in dark sepia and lacking hatching strokes on the serpent's wings, the chest, stomach, and left hip of the man (Brunelleschi) in the serpent's grasp, on the upper left thigh of the man on the right and on the stomach of his companion (second figure from the right), on the robe worn by Dante (left-most figure), on the ground beneath his

84 BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY Winter 1990/91

4. Dante engravings plate 3. India paper laid on wove. Lessing J. Rosenwald Collec-tion, National Gallery of Art, Washington.

feet, lower left, and in the landscape back-ground to the left of Dante's right upper arm and to the right of Virgil's hands. Bru-nelleschi's left thigh bears some hatching that was burnished away in the published state to create a highlight. The spiky vege-tation below and to the left of Brunell-eschi's right foot has been burnished away on its left side in the published state. The lower reaches of the rock above and to the left of this vegetation have also been re-moved. Reproduced Keynes, Blake's Illus­trations of Dante.

PI. 6, "The Pit of Disease: The Falsifiers." British Museum, Department of Prints and Drawings, accession no. 1929.7.13.276 (illus. 1). Three figures in the lower left corner are incomplete; two are only scratched in outline. The figure on all fours just to the right and the supine figure above lack some shading strokes. The densely packed lines in the sky, just to the right of the arch of stony figures on the left, lack a few strokes. The faces of Dante and Virgil, upper left, are incomplete. This proof state may also lack some cloud lines top right, but the abraded surface of the print in this area leaves the matter indeterminable.

PI. 7, "Dante Striking Against Bocca degli Abati." Houghton Library, Harvard Univer-sity, Cambridge, Massachusetts, bequeathed by Philip Hofer in 1984. Virgil's left hand is raised to his face rather than to his chest (published state). Lacking many shading lines on the standing figures, particularly Virgil, the crosshatching on Abati's right shoulder and a few lines around his mouth, and the tears on the cheeks of the old man on the left side of the column of figures on the right. Reproduced Keynes, Blake's Illustrations of Dante. A later proof state in the British Museum, Department of Prints and Drawings, lacks only the finish-ing strokes defining the hands of the stand-ing figures and a few lines on their clothing (accession no. 19297.13.277).

In Blake Studies, Keynes states that

lot 179 in the Linnell sale at Christie's,

15 March 1918, contained a "set of

early proofs, probably those made by

Blake himself" (229). Although

Keynes may have inspected this lot

(sold to Colnaghi for£26.5s.), he offers

no evidence for this claim, which on

the face of it seems unlikely. The auc-

tion catalogue describes this lot as

"India Proof Impressions, before all

letters, loosely inserted in an oblong

folio vol., boards." None of the traced

working proofs are on laid India,

whereas all the nineteenth-century im-

pressions recorded in the Linnell fami-

ly papers and the Dixon & Ross

daybook are. Even in their final states,

none of the plates bears any letters

(signature, imprint, title below the

image), except for the easily-over-

looked scratched inscription in reverse

within the design on plate 1. The next

lot (180) is described as "Five Similar

Sets" (£22.Is. to Maggs, a price per-

haps influenced by the condition of

the prints), and the next lot is also

called "Five Similar Sets" (£31.10s. to

Riches). Thus, nothing in the

catalogue clearly separates the "Proof

Impressions" from those which were

almost certainly in final states. In this

context, "Proof' probably means noth-

ing more than "early." The mere fact that

all these lots were sold by the Linnell

family is of no significance in determin-

ing states or printing dates in the

nineteenth century. In recent years,

dealers and auction houses have some-

times trumpeted the claim that a Dante

set on laid India paper is "from the

Linnell Family," or something to mat

effect. They can never go wrong with

this assertion about India-paper im-

pressions, for all originally belonged

to the Linnells.

The next impressions to be pulled

after Blake's own working proofs are

probably those printed directly on laid

paper (not to be confused with India

paper laid on wove) showing clear

wire and chain lines, the latter approx-

imately 3-7 cm. apart. Such a set was

sold from the Doheny Memorial Li-

brary at Christie's New York, 21

February 1989, lot 1713, plate 2 illus-

trated in the auction catalogue (sold to

the New York dealer Donald Heald for

$60,500). Part of a watermark, or coun-

termark, "A & D," is present in plate 3-

The heavy foxing of most impressions

in this set cannot mask the fact that

these are superb impressions that jus-

tify the record price. All major en-

graved lines are dark, rich, and precise,

while the drypoint sketching lines yet

to be cut with the graver are delicately

yet fully printed. Each plate in this

suite reveals its superiority over all

India-paper impressions I have seen.

Winter 1990/91 BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY 85

Much of this excellence is the result of

expert inking and wiping of the plates'

surfaces, but the quality of these im-

pressions also indicates that the cop-

perplates had not begun to show any

effects of wear. The clarity with which

each line is printed, even in densely-

engraved passages, without any blur-

ring of the boundaries between lines,

suggests that the edges of each in-

cision were still sharp and had not yet

rounded to a gradual slope. This round-

ing can begin to occur after as few as

ten impressions have been pulled

from a copperplate. This initial wear is

probably caused both by running the

plates through the rolling press and by

the inking process, for the craftsman

must wipe the surface of an intaglio

copperplate with dozens of strokes of

his hand in preparation for taking a

single impression.

As Thomas Lange has reminded me,

another fine set on laid paper, also

nastily foxed, is in the Pierpont Morgan

Library, New York. A mixed group, with

plate 1 on India laid on wove, lacking

plate 4, and plates 2-3, 5-7 on laid

paper , was sold in London at

Christie's, 29 June 1989, lot 13, plate 2

illustrated in the auction catalogue

(£24,200 to the London print dealer

William Weston). From this group I

have seen only plate 3; but the auction

catalogue reports that plates 6 and 7,

both on the laid stock, show "part of a

watermark [or countermark?] A & D."15

Weston tells me that these impressions

were foxed badly enough to require

careful cleaning; clearly, this laid

paper has an inherent tendency to be-

come stained in this way. Yet, in my

view, they are the most desirable im-

pressions of the published states.

The existence of the laid-paper prints

is more than a little disconcerting. Blake

used wove paper for almost all his il-

luminated books and original separate

plates he printed himself.16 Linnell con-

sistently favored India paper laid on

wove and probably influenced Blake's

choice of those papers for some of his

late intaglio graphics, including the

"proof" issue of the Job illustrations in

1826. The documentary record of Dante

printings makes no mention of laid-

paper impressions. Indeed, that record

would seem to exclude them, for all

the press runs noted by John Linnell,

Jr., and the Dixon & Ross daybook

specify India paper. The laid-paper im-

pressions suggest an unrecorded press

run early in the history of the Dante

plates. And if there was one such print-

ing, might there have been others? I

have no clear evidence of any further

printings, but the mere possibility gives

one pause before making bold state-

ments about the total number of Dante

impressions and their dates.

The quality of the laid-paper impres-

sions indicates a printing date before

the first India paper pulls of 26 Sep-

tember 1838. It is unlikely that they

were printed by Blake himself. He left

all seven Dante plates unfinished at his

death in 1827, and there would have

been no reason to print fine sets of the

plates while there was any hope of

developing them to a more complete

state. Blake's own working proofs, listed

above, show areas of careless inking,

as is often the case when a printmaker

is taking impressions merely to check

his progress. Perhaps the laid-paper

impressions were taken by Dixon &

Ross, or some other plate printer, just

prior to the first recorded printing as a

way of showing Linnell how expertly

they could perform the task. This spec-

ulation, however, does not explain

why at least two full sets, plus at least

a third impression of plates 2-3, 5-7,

were printed. The mysteries surround-

ing these beautiful laid-paper impres-

sions only enhance their desirability.

We are now left with a variety of

India-paper impressions, printed in two

press runs in 1838 and one c. 1892—if

we can still trust the completeness of

the documentary record. How can these

be sorted out and ascribed to the print-

ing in which each was produced? De-

tailed comparisons of printing quality

(never fully captured by photographs)

and paper types (at best only hinted at

by photos) are hindered by the wide

dispersal of the Dante sets. The largest

group I have found in one place is in

the Huntington Library, but its four

complete copies, plus one set in my

collection, provide only a small sam-

pling of the whole number extant.

Visual memory, p r o p p e d up by

photos, must serve in such circumstan-

ces, in spite of their obvious limita-

tions. The dimensions and thicknesses

of backing papers can also be useful,

but these too have their limits. Only

untrimmed sheets can tell us what the

original (and presumably uniform)

sheet size was. The thickness of the

same hand-made stock, even when

produced in the same mold, can vary by

measurable amounts. Even a single

sheet can yield measurements that

vary as much as 25%, depending on

where one places the micrometer or

paper gauge. All that follows should

be understood in light of these caveats.

Among the dozen or more India-

paper suites I have seen over the years,

I have found a surprising uniformity in

the quality of the impressions. The Lin-

nell family was too successful, as far as

my research is concerned, in replicat-

ing the 1838 impressions in 1892.

There are of course small differences,

but these can be accounted for by dif-

ferences in inking of the sort that can

occur within a single press run. For-

tunately, one plate escapes this frustrat-

ing uniformity. Its special qualities

require some background explanation.

Blake executed the Dante plates in

a combination of drypoint, used mostly

for preliminary sketching of outlines,

and pure engraving without etching.

In the latter technique, the tool is pushed

through the metal to create V-shaped

incisions. The metal removed takes the

form of thin, curling wires. These are

removed from each line as the engraver

works over the plate. A drypoint needle

creates a very different by-product. As

the craftsman drags the needle across

the metal surface, it leaves behind a

"burr" on one or both sides of the

furrow, much like the wake behind a

86 BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY Winter 1990/91

speedboat. This burr will catch and

hold ink, even after the printer has

wiped the surface of the metal clean,

and its presence will register in impres-

sions from the plate as a slight fuzzi-

ness or striations along the margins of

drypoint lines. The burr, however,

wears off the plate very quickly, and

thus can serve as a useful (albeit ap-

proximate) index of the relative print-

ing dates of two impressions if at least

one shows some burr. That is, an im-

pression with rich burr will probably

be earlier than one with only a little,

and this second impression earlier

than one with none at all.

All the Dante plates show evidence

of drypoint sketching, but only one

shows any clear evidence of burr even

in the early laid-paper impressions.

Blake's friend George Cumberland held

that "the very early impressions of an-

cient [meaning early Italian] Prints in

general" are not "the best, as they par-

take of the remainders of the Burrs, . . .

but the best are those clear impressions

which came early afterwards, when the

Printer's hand had entirely destroyed

that Burr, and well polished the plate

at the same time."17 The graphic style

of the Dante plates owes much to Italian

Renaissance prints, particularly those

by Andrea Mantegna and his circle.18 If

Blake shared Cumberland's opinions

about such prints and made them a

part of his own linearist, anti-chiaros-

curo aesthetic, then he may have pur-

posely removed burr as he worked.

The one exception is plate 3, arguably

the least developed in the series. Some

impressions, including Heald's on laid

paper, show rich burr in the swirling

lines lower right (illus. 2), on Dante

and Virgil, in the landscape to the right,

and on the seated figures center right

(illus. 3). Just to the left of Dante and

Virgil is a cluster of drypoint scratches

that barely penetrated the copper ex-

cept at their upper terminations. These

are unrelated to the composition and

are probably an unavoidable conse-

quence of Blake having tested his dry-

point needle. Like the burr, these

shallow lines could be removed easily.

If not erased, they would slowly wear

off the plate during inking. Impres-

sions without burr, and with only the

slightest evidence of the scratched lines

left of Virgil and Dante (illus. 4), are

probably later than those showing both

these features (illus. 2). The alterations

over time in the condition of plate 3 are

confirmed by the twentieth-century im-

pressions, all of which show no evi-

dence of either burr or the scratched

lines (illus. 5), and by the present ap-

pearance of the copperplate (illus. 6).

The burr on plate 3 can serve as a

rough indication of the relative chron-

ology of impressions from that plate

and, by extension, the chronology of

its companions in the same suite—as-

suming that the suite is uniform as to

paper, ink color, etc. Before applying

this rule of thumb to the India-paper

impressions, a cautionary note must

be sounded. Burr records wear that

occurs during inking and printing, not

the gaps between print runs. All bun-

can be eliminated, gradually but com-

pletely, in the course of a single print-

ing or retained through the early pulls

of the next, no matter how many years

pass between the two operations. It is

highly unlikely for the very last frag-

ments of burr to appear in the last

impression of a press run, and thus for

the first impression without burr to

correspond precisely with the first pull

of the next printing. Further, the wiping

of the plate during the inking process

will affect the amount of burr indicated

in an impression. For example, the

Weston impression of plate 3 on laid

paper shows considerably less burr

than the Heald impression on the same

paper, even though both were very

probably pulled in the same early press

run. The direction in which the crafts-

man moves his hand for the final time

over the burr areas will influence the

amount of ink they retain. And we

cannot assume that commercial plate

printers of the last century took con-

scious measures to preserve evidence

of burr or the test marks left of Dante

and Virgil. Thus, slight variations in the

amount of bun- serve as a poor index

of printing chronology. Only large-scale

differences, such as those indicated by

illus. 2 and 4, are very useful, and even

then we must allow for the possibility

that a few early pulls show no burr and

a few later ones reveal its continued

presence. We can have the most con-

fidence in chronologies suggested by

burr when supported by other types of

evidence.

The Heald impression of plate 3

printed directly on laid paper shows

the richest burr I have seen. But India-

paper impressions laid on to a wove,

hard surface, card-like paper, .46 mm.

thick and without a watermark, show

almost as much burr and reveal the test

marks left of Dante and Virgil just as

clearly. One such impression—the only

one I have been able to compare

directly with others—is in a complete

set, with all plates on the same backing

paper, in the Huntington Library (call

no. 57438).19 This paper is so dense

and thick that, when held to a backing

light, it is completely opaque. In the

Huntington set, bound in late nine-

teenth- or early twentieth-century full

leather by Riviere & Son, the backing

sheets measure 40.5 x 57.5 cm. (i.e., a

little less than a half-sheet of Colom-

bier) with all edges gilt. Another such

set, formerly in the collection of Sir

Geoffrey Keynes,20 is beautifully repro-

duced full-size in his Blake's Illustra­

tions of Dante. Its backing sheets

measure 40.2 x 56.1 cm. Approximately

the same dimensions are found in the

only other thick-paper set I have lo-

cated, now in the Kerrison Preston Blake

Library, Westminster City Library, Lon-

don.21 Both the Keynes and Preston

sets are bound in green cloth with

"BLAKE'S DANTE" stamped in gilt on

the front cover and the letterpress Dante

label, printed by Linnell for the 1838

issue, pasted to the inside front cover.

This is probably the original binding in

which such suites were issued.22

The conclusion, based on the pres-

ence of the burr, that these thick-paper

Winter 1990/91 BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY 87

sets are early impressions can be

refined further by documentary evi-

dence that such prints were pulled in

the first press run of 26 September

1838. One easily-overlooked detail in

the Dixon & Ross daybook, quoted

earlier, is particularly significant. The

backing paper of the first printing is

listed as "th[/c]k," whereas no such ad-

jective modifies the same Mpl[fl]t[eJ Col-

[ombier]" used for the second printing

(29 September). Keynes reports that

the Dante set sold from the collection

of the Marquis of Crewe at Sotheby's,

8 May 1943, lot 312 (£68 to the London

dealer Francis Edwards), was "similar"

to his thick-paper suite {Blake's Illus­

trations of Dante [2]) and was bound

in the same green cloth stamped in gilt

{Blake Studies 228). This Crewe copy,

now untraced, bore an inscription on

a flyleaf: "A few copies may be had of

Mr. Chance, 28 London Street, Fitzroy

Square, W, Artists Proofs £3.13.6. only 25

copies printed" (Bentley, Blake Books

545). The Preston set contains a clip-

ping, pasted to the inside front cover,

from an unidentified dealer's cata-

logue that similarly claims that the im-

pressions are "Artist's Proofs, only 25

copies printed." These statements fur-

ther associate the prints on India paper

laid on thick wove with the first press

run. To call them "Artist's Proofs" is

certainly misleading, particularly since

the artist had been dead for eleven

years when they were printed, but the

casual and self-serving use of the word

"proof is hardly unique in the annals

of print selling (see my earlier com-

ments on the 1918 Linnell sale). In this

context, the term means, if it means

anything at all, that these impressions

are from the first press run. The connec-

tion with "Mr. Chance" and the number

of "copies printed" are even more sig-

nificant. In a letter dated 30 December

1856 (Ivimy collection), James H.

Chance wrote as follows to his uncle,

John Linnell: "I received the case quite

safe with the 2[F] setslfl of Dante &

Two proofs of Emmaus[.?] which are

very beautiful (yesterday), and possib-

ly I may be able to do something with

them amongst my connexion. The Dante

5. Dante engravings plate 3, restrike of 1968. Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection, Nation-al Gallery of Art, Washington.

6. Dante engravings plate 3, Blake's original copperplate. Lessing J. Rosenwald Collec-tion, National Gallery of Art, Washington.

cS<S BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY Winter 1990/91

& Blake I have entirely on my own

speculation being partial to them and

if I can do any thing with them I shall

be happy to enter into some agree-

ments for 25 Copies. . . ."23 Whether

Chance carried out these plans is not

known, but the inscription in the Crewe

set indicates that he sold at least one of

the so-called "Artist's Proofs" printed

on India laid on thick wove in the 26

September press run of 25 sets. Per-

haps the Crewe and Preston sets are

the two Chance notes he had already

received.

It would be most convenient if we

were now left with India-paper im-

pressions on only two types of backing

papers that could be ascribed confi-

dendy to the second (29 September

1838) and third (c. 1892) printings of

the Dante plates. But the life of a chal-

cographer is rarely that simple, and

what I have found instead is a be-

wildering variety of just off-white wove

backing papers. All measure between

.25 and .34 mm. in thickness and are

only semi-opaque when held to a

backing light. These characteristics are

useful in distinguishing such prints from

the thick-paper (.46 mm.) impressions,

but the range of only .09 mm. in thick-

ness is insufficient for making clear

discriminations among India-paper

impressions on the thinner backing

papers. Sheet sizes are of no help in

separating out 1838 and c. 1892 im-

pressions since no India-paper print I

have measured is larger than the half-

sheets (about 48 x 597 cm.) into which

the Colombier-size paper was cut for

both 1838 press runs. Here again, the

success the Linnells had in matching the

earlier prints in their c. 1892 restrikes

thwarts the modern investigator.

Fortunately, some of the India-paper

sets on the thinner backing papers can

be identified on the basis of water-

marks. I list below those I know of,

with a few other particulars added.

1. "1822" followed at a considerable dis-tance by "II [followed by an illegible letter fragment cut off]," with a countermark of "S & [cut off]." This paper is at the lower end of the range of thicknesses, is more

pliable, and has a smoother and softer surface texture than all others listed here. A complete and uniform set is in the Hun-tington Library (call no. 57437), pi. 3 with the watermark fragment of letters, pis. 1, 3-7 with the date, and pis. 1, 4-7 with the countermark fragment. Sheets 44.5 x 59 cm., deckle edges right and bottom, minor foxing. A mixed group of nine impressions of the seven Dante plates in the Rosenwald Collection, National Gallery of Art, Wash-ington, shows the "1822" watermark in pi. 2 only. PI. 3 in the Huntington set shows considerable burr, roughly equivalent to that found in the impression reproduced here as illus. 2.

2. Fragment of an italic capital "N," the remainder trimmed off. Found in pis. 1 and 3 of a complete (and apparently uniform) set in the Huntington Library (call no. 283403). Sheets 39.5 x 54.4 cm., one or two edges with deckle, the India paper (but not the backing paper) evenly browned on pi. 2. Pi. 3 shows no burr lower right and only very slight burr on Dante and Virgil. Only ghosts of Blake's test scratches remain. The same amounts of burr and the scratches left of Dante and Virgil appear in a uniform set in my collection, sheets 39 x 54 cm., one or two deckle edges, the India paper of pis. 2 and 5 evenly browned, showing frag-ments of the UN" watermark on pis. 1, 5, and 6. A fragment of this watermark is reported to be in a set offered by Seren-dipity Books, Berkeley, California, December 1979, catalogue 39, item P 128, for $13,000 (untraced). The dealer's catalogue claims that there is more burr on this set than in the set owned by Mrs. Landon K. Thorne (now in the Pierpont Morgan Library), which also contains frag-ments of the "N" watermark.

3. Letters, perhaps three or four, so poorly formed and densely packed together that they are illegible. Found in pis. 1 and 3 of a complete (and apparently uniform) set sold from the collection of The Garden Ltd., formed by Haven O'More, Sotheby's New York, 10 November 1989, lot 168 ($41,250 to Donald Heald). Sheets 39.7 x 54 cm., no burr on pi. 3.

4. "/ Whatman Turkey Mills." Variously reported in the following auction cata-logues as present in complete sets: Sotheby's London, 7 March 1985, lot 200, with a reproduction of pi. 3 showing no burr lower right but with fragments of the scratches left of Dante and Virgil as in illus. 4 (£23,100, untraced); Sotheby's London, 27 June 1986, lot 747 (£24,200, untraced); Sotheby's London, 27 June 1988, lot 168 (£24,200, untraced); Sotheby's London, 27 June 1989, lot 226, sold from the "Property

of a Member of the Linnell Family" (£38,500, untraced). Some of these may be resales of the same set, but it seems unlike-ly that they all represent only a single set.

The information recorded above al-

lows us to draw a few conclusions.

More than one backing paper must

have been used in the second printing

of 1838 and/or in the c. 1892 press

run—assuming that there was no un-

recorded printing in addition to the

fine early pulls on laid paper (described

earlier). It seems unlikely that the 1822

paper (no. 1, above) would have been

used c. 1892, and even a little surpris-

ing that it would have been available

in any quantity in 1838 (although the

papermaker may have retained the

1822 mark in later years). Perhaps the

uneconomical size of the second re-

corded printing of 1838—only 13 sets

—and the four extra pulls (what com-

mercial use would they have had?)

were dictated by a limited amount of

this 1822 paper. Of course this hypo-

thesis assumes, rather rashly, that no

other backing paper was used in the

1838 second printing. The presence of

burr on the only impression located of

plate 3 printed on this paper buttresses

the conclusion that it was used in 1838.

All other backing papers listed here,

nos. 2-4, are remarkably similar, at least

to my eyes and fingers, as to color,

texture, and density. William LinneU's

statement, in his recently discovered

letter to Quaritch quoted earlier, that

he preferred Whatman paper for the c.

1892 impressions does not insure that

it was actually used; but this letter does

lend support to the evidence of the

burr (or lack thereoD on at least one

impression of plate 3 indicating that

sets on Whatman were pulled c. 1892.

Circumstantial evidence, cited and in-

terpreted (probably by Richard Godfrey)

in Sotheby's 27 June 1986 catalogue,

further tips the scales toward 1892.

The set sold in lot 747, with one back-

ing sheet showing part of the Whatman

watermark, was the suite Keynes ac-

quired from "the last [nineteenth-cen-

tury] printing of the plates" during a visit

to the Linnell family home at Redhill.24

Winter 1990/91 BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRATED QUARTERLY 89

Only two backing papers remain,

nos. 2 and 3 above. The rule of thumb

based on the amount of burr in plate

3, combined with the weight of num-

bers (only 13 complete sets p roduced

in the second printing of 1838, but 50

in c. 1892), leads me to conclude that

both types of paper signify the c. 1892

printing. However, the impression of

plate 3 reproduced here, illus. 2-3,

showing almost as much burr as the

thick-paper pulls of the first printing,

is on a backing sheet of unwatermarked

paper which I cannot distinguish from

my set with the "N" watermark.2 51 can

only conclude from this that either a

paper in addition to the "1822" variety

was used in the second printing of

1838, or the copperplate of plate 3 re-

tained considerable burr after 1838 and

this shows u p in the first few pulls of

c. 1892. If the latter is the case, as seems

the more likely of the two possibilities,

then the rule of burr cannot be used to

discriminate in all cases be tween the

second and third press runs.

In spite of its length, the foregoing is

little better than an interim report. It

concludes with the spectacle of a Blake

nut imitating plate 10 of The Gates of

Paradise ("Help! Help!") . It wou ld be

good to find more sets with the 1822

watermark, and more impressions of

plate 3 with burr on any sort of backing

paper . An impression on Whatman

paper showing rich burr would force

major revisions in the history concoc-

ted here. So let me offer my services as

a Dante Clearinghouse and invite in-

terested readers to send me informa-

tion about Dante engravings they have

i n s p e c t e d . W o r k i n g t o g e t h e r , w e

should at least be able to complicate

matters further.

I am indebted to Ruth Fine and Greg

Jecmen of the National Gallery of Art,

Washington, Arthur Freeman, and Thomas

V. Lange for their help with the research

reported in this essay.

]G. E. Bentley, Jr., and Martin K. Nurmi, A Blake Bibliography (Minneapolis: Univ. of Minnesota Press, 1964) 89- The inter-polations in brackets are from Bentley and Nurmi.

2The senior Linnell lived at 38 Por-chester Terrace, Bayswater, from 1828 to 1851, and thus his son's comment that the Dante plates were printed "at Bayswater" (i.e., while the family lived there) is not very helpful in fixing a date.

3Bentley and Nurmi 89- For information on Dixon & Ross (founded 1833) and its successor firm, see Iain Bain, "Thomas Ross & Son, Copper- and Steel-plate Printers since 1833," Journal of the Print-ing Historical Society no. 2 (1966): 3-22, and Tony Dyson, "The Ross Records: 1833 to 1900," Journal of the Printing Historical Society no. 12 (1977-78): 52-67.

4A11 information about the Linnell family is taken from Alfred T. Story, The Life of John Linnell, 2 vols. (London: Bentley and Son, 1892), based in large part on the elder Linnell's manuscript autobiography, and Katharine Crouan,/o£n Linnell: A Centen-nial Exhibition (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1982). I have not been able to find the death dates of any of the Linnell brothers. Presumably John Jr. was still alive in 1892, if Bentley and Nurmi and Keynes (see note 5) are correct in ascribing the draft letter in the Ivimy collection to his hand.

5Keynes, "A Note on the Later History of the Dante Engravings," Blake Studies: Es-says on His Life and Work, 2nd ed. (Ox-ford: Clarendon Press, 1971) 228-29 (the first publication of this "Note"); Blake's Illustrations of Dante (London: Trianon Press for the Blake Trust, 1978) [2]. In the 1978 volume, Keynes states that "one hundred sets" were printed c. 1892 ([21), but gives no documentary evidence for this number, twice as large as the figure recorded by John Linnell, Jr. I assume that Keynes is simply mistaken on this point. Todd, in his essay on the twentieth-century restrikes (see note 13), repeats Keynes's figure for the c. 1892 printing and claims that "170 sets" were printed in 1838 (p. 4 in the last version of Todd's essay). Todd cites Bentley and Nurmi (88-89) as the authority for this latter number, but they say nothing about the number of impres-sions pulled in 1838 other than quoting the receipts. I take Todd's "170" to be another error.

6G. E. Bentley, Jr., Blake Books (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977) 545. Except for "[sheets]", used here in the place of ditto marks in the original, the bracketed inter-polations are Bentley's.

1Blake's Illustrations of Dante [2]. In Blake Studies, Keynes calls the backing

sheets for the laid India "(French) Colom-bier plate paper" (228).

8See E. J. Labarre, A Dictionary of Paper and Paper-Making Terms (Amsterdam: Swets & Zeitlinger, 1937) 54.

s>See Whatman's mold sizes recorded in Thomas Balston, James Whatman Father & Son (London: Methuen, 1957) 6l. La-barre 54 gives the same dimensions as the standard for Colombier.

10Bain 7. 1'According to Ted Gott, "'Eternity in an

Hour': The Prints of William Blake," in Martin Butlin and Gott, William Blake in the Collection of the National Gallery of Victoria (Melbourne: National Gallery of Victoria, 1989) 187-88.

12I take the titles for each plate from those given the corresponding water colors in Martin Butlin, The Paintings and Draw-ings of William Blake (New Haven: Yale UP, 1981).

^Information about the 1968 printing is taken from Ruthven Todd, "Blake's Dante Plates," Times Literary Supplement (29 August 1968): 928, and its two revisions: "Blake's Dante Plates—Revised Version," Book Collecting & Library Monthly no. 6 (October 1968): 164-71, and Blake's Dante Plates, Reprinted, with Additions, from the October 1968 Issue o/Book Collecting & Library Monthly (n.p., n.d.). All references to Todd are to the final version. The com-plete 1968 set in the National Gallery of Victoria is reproduced in Gott, figs. 50a-g.

"Bentley, Blake Books 546, records "proofs of each [Dante plate] in the BMPR," but I have been able to locate only the three described here. The handlist of the British Museum collection in Blake News-letter 5 (1972): 236, lists "Five Dante trial proofs" of pis. 2 (two impressions), 4, 6-7, accession nos. 1929.7.13-273-77, but two of these (pi. 2, no. 274, and pi. 4, no. 275) are in their published states.

15I am unable to identify this watermark, but it may have been produced by John Dickinson at the Apsley Mill he acquired in 180S>—see W. A. Churchill, Watermarks in Paper (Amsterdam: Hertzberger & Co., 1925) 48.

l6The only exceptions known to me are copy L of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell ("A Song of Liberty" only, printed as a pamphlet of two leaves), the unique first-state impression of "Joseph of Arimathea Among the Rocks of Albion" (Fitzwilliam Museum), perhaps printed in the 1770s when Blake as still an apprentice, and the unique impression of "Charity" (British Museum).

17Cumberland, An Essay on the Utility of Collecting the Best Works of the Ancient

90 BLAKE/AN ILLUSTRA TED QUARTERL Y Winter 1990/91

Engravers of the Italian School (London: Payne and Foss et al., 1827) 20.

18See Robert N. Essick, William Blake Printmaker(Princeton: Princeton UP, 1980) 250-54. Cumberland showed Blake the manuscript of his Essay in November 1823 (G. E. Bentley.Jr., Blake Records[Oxford: Clarendon Press, 19691 279).

19This suite is wrongly described as "probably the restrikes of ca. 1892" in Robert N. Essick, The Works of William Blake in the Huntington Collections (San Marino: Huntington Library, 1985) 209. All such sets are similarly (and wrongly) char-acterized in Sotheby's New York auction catalogue of 9-10 November 1989, lot 168.

20 This set was not part of Keynes's be-quest to the Fitzwilliam Museum. Accord-ing to J. J. Hall, Under-Librarian in the Rare Book Department, Cambridge University Library, the set cannot be located in the Keynes Collection there.

21Very well reproduced, with enlarged details from each plate, in David Bindman, assisted by Deirdre Toomey, The Complete Graphic Works of William Blake ([London]: Thames and Hudson, 1978) pis. 647-53. This may be the same as the set which Keynes describes as similar to his own and "until recently, in the possession of the Linnell family" iBlake's Illustrations of Dante[2]).

22 This is also the conclusion stated inde-pendently about each of these copies in Kerrison Preston, Notes for a Catalogue of the Blake Library at the Georgian House Merstham (Cambridge: Golden Head Press, I960) 10, and [Keynes], Bibliotheca Biblio-grapbici: A Catalogue of the Library Formed by Geoffrey KeynesiLondon: Trianon Press, 1964) 65.

23Bentley, Blake Books 545. "Emmaus" very probably refers to Linnell's line and mezzotint print of his own painting, "The Journey to Emmaus," dated 17 June 1839

in the imprint. "Dante & Blake" is a bit odd; perhaps Chance meant "Dante by Blake."

24Keynes, Blake's Illustrations of Dante [2]. I cannot confirm the claim in Sotheby's catalogue that this visit was in 1912, but in The Gates of Memory (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981) 103, Keynes notes that he acquired a Dante set during one of his two visits to Redhill "before 1914."

25A Dante set on laid India with very similar amounts of burr in pi. 3, now in a British private collection, was sold the property of D. R. Bollard ( J o n n Linnell's great-grandson) at Sotheby's London, 14 November 1980, lot 295, in poor Oaut prob-ably repairable) condition (£5100). I have no information about its backing paper, but all seven plates are reproduced in The Print in England 1790-1930: Catalogue of an Exhibition First Shown at the Fitzwil-liam Museum 12 March to 5 May 1985 (Cambridge: Fitzwilliam Museum, 1985) 54-60.

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